A Boy Named Addy
by Eines Zwei Drei
Summary: I wish I could say that this was a once upon a time story, but not many once upon time stories, start with once upon time there was a kegger. [Complete]
1. Addy's Introduction

_This takes place after 'Keg! Max!'_

_Disclaimer: I, of course, do not own anything Gilmore Girls, i have created a few original characters i'm sure you'll recognize them when you see them._

_Enjoy, and if you like it leave a review._

* * *

I wish I could say that this was a once upon a time story, but not many one upon time stories, start with once upon time there was a kegger. Perhaps I could say once upon a time there was a boy and girl, who were never really right for each other; perfect opposites, but somehow at the exact same moment; the same. They could be friends, and they could be more than friends. He had, in teenage bad boy style, issues, deep stemming abandonment issues that caused him to be introverted, quiet, and hostile, and two years after they had first met, starting out as near-enemies, ending as a couple, he left her. However, not before the aforementioned Kegger. I'm sure you can imagine what happened, a keg, a loud band, a broody boy hanging out in an upstairs bedroom waiting for his girlfriend to come and find him. I think they loved each other, but I can never know for sure.  
  
He left her and when he came back, everyone had some choice words for him. His own uncle wanted to throw him down on the sidewalk and kick him until he found a way to turn back time. His girlfriend's mother wanted to spit in his face, and shout as many curses that could be strung together in one breath, and she did. The girlfriend's grandparents wanted to string him up by a tree and dismember him, but stood for a verbal abuse in which they ended up the good ones. The girlfriend, wanted a future she wanted to take the big envelopes she received from Yale, Princeton and Harvard and brood over them, and create pro's and con's lists, she wanted to take long winded classes where the whole premise was books on undeterminable origin, and meaning. She wanted to be a writer and travel the world, she didn't want a baby. But have one she did. Feeling shunned and useless she pleaded with him, to take her away; to take her away from the shell-shocked looked on her mothers face, from the ariant stares of the townspeople, from the angry and bitter tone of her grandmother. Grudgingly, he did, and in doing so he scrapped his last little bit of dignity, begging money off his father. Retracing all the time he never spent with him, all the hardship he had to go through because he was not there, Jimmy Mariano sent a check and never saw his son again. So there they were, eighteen years old, shacked up, knocked up, in a tiny part of New York City trying their best to get by, trying their best to get along. This is, I suppose, where I come in. I'm Addy, or I guess you can call me Addicus. I was born in New York City under begrudging pretences, maybe not unhappy, but I was not their first course of action. This is me, the illegitimate son, of Rory Gilmore and Jess Mariano. Grandson of Lorelai Gilmore, Christopher Hayden, Liz Danes and Jimmy Mariano. Some days I lay awake, questioning myself, but I didn't chose to be born, that's what my Dad said to me once, it's not a choice I made, and it's not a choice they made, but it was a choice he was glad to have. When I was 14, in a hard and questioning place in my life, I asked my Dad to tell me the true story; the whole story, and he did.  
  
Jess received a phone call in California, which he did not expect, since he told no one, where he was. Luckily Lorelai would tell him later, Mariano's in California are not that popular, she only reached fifteen dead ends, before getting a surly Jimmy. As Jess took the long bus ride back to the small town, and the small town people he was so keen on escaping, I wonder what he thought. Did he think about Rory, and how he still loved her? Did he think about that night? With the pounding music in the background, both a little drunk and did he wonder whether it was worth derailing his life? Did he worry about people's reaction? Or did he knead his eyebrows over the future? But then again it's a long bus ride; I think he might have had room, for all of them. Rory was content being like her mother in many ways, her addiction to caffeine-loaded beverages, her obsession with strange movies, and even stranger take-out food, and her dry sense of humour. But Rory did not want to be the kind of person that got pregnant at 18. She had always been the good girl, the valedictorian of her high school prep class, the girl that had been called Mary, the girl who had her first kiss at 16, the girl who preferred books to boys most of the time. Her mother despite her volcano blowing anger, disappointment and pity was adamant that it would not be so bad after all. She had gone the same route and it had all worked out for her, in the end. That conversation left the nail in the coffin, there would be no abortion, no adoption, this baby was hers and she was keeping it.  
  
I was born, on January 7th, 2004, in New York City. They named me Addicus Paul Mariano. I hate to think what their first few days were alone with me, in their tiny apartment where the colicky wails of a newborn bounced off the walls, and filled the air with mind-bending noise. They persevered, they did their best. Just as the eviction note was about to be displayed, just as the dejected return to Stars Hollow seemed ominous, Rory found a job. It wasn't a good job, the pay was in the gutter, and the thought of pride was flushed away, as she brought coffee to all the writers at the New York Chronicle. She answered their phones, addressed their envelopes and made their coffee, bidding her time until her moment would come. It did come, it took time, it took patience, but she did it, and by the time I was 11 months old, her life was on track again. She had coveted the job she always wanted, a journalist, for the London Chronicle. They discussed it, and they decided against telling their families. They didn't tell a soul, they applied for green cards, they got plane tickets and they left the country.   
  
I don't remember the place I was born, the little apartment we lived in, I don't remember the look on my Mom's face when she came home glowing with a grin that stretched from ear to ear, I don't remember my Dad picking her up giggling and running around the room, I don't remember that, but it happened. The first apartment they had in England wasn't much bigger than the one they had in New York, but they had a new sense of purpose, a renewed hope. Everyday Rory went off to work, covering the smallest stories, the ones with the least importance, and she did them, she put all of her energy, all of her strength into making those little articles the best articles. Jess was proud of her, proud of her when she came home late and left early, proud of her when he stayed at home and took care of me, proud of her when they cut out her articles and tacked them on the walls. Genuine newspaper articles, written by Rory Gilmore. She hadn't forgotten her dream that she had been dreaming for since she was ten, so that when impressed by the growing excellence of her articles, her editor offered to send her to Italy to cover the beautification of an English patriot, she jumped at the chance and took off running.   
  
That was just the beginning. I spent a lot of time with my Dad; he found a job that allowed him to stay at home with me, the picture perfect job for the high school drop-out who adored books. A book reviewer for a hole in the wall magazine in East London. Some of my earliest memories centre around my Dad reading to me, sitting in the park, or in our front room. Reading new best sellers, and beat classics. My first memory, is sitting on my Dad's lap, I was probably around two as he read from 'the Town and the City' by Jack Kerouac to me. Maybe I don't really remember it, maybe I do. I know I love that book and I always feel comforted reading it, it reminds me of home, it reminds me of good times, and it reminds me of family. I love my Mom and I respect her for what she accomplished, for being faced with such odds and achieving anyway. She travelled the world, and Dad and I stayed home and that was fine, because he took me to preschool, he made me snacks, we watched TV, and read. He tucked me into bed at night and woke me up in the morning and I loved every minute of it and everyday she was there was just a nice bonus. I had souvenirs from all over the world; I had wooden shoes from Holland, a snake in a jar of formaldehyde from Vietnam, sand from Israel, a Fez from Turkey. I had all those things, but I didn't really have a Mom, but I think I was too young to understand that.   
  
I hate to imagine the look of shock on her face, the sinking of her heart, the words muttered under her breath, when she found to her great surprise that she was again pregnant at the age of 22. I'm sure it was a hard choice for her to make, to put her life on hold again, to bring another child into the world. So they ended up sitting at a doctors office, speaking in low tones on what they wanted to do. They had opposite opinions. When the doctor entered the room, and looked at the two twenty somethings sitting in his office, the girl with an unimpressed look on her face, while the boy leaned in the corner his arms crossed on his chest, he kept his mouth shut. In the last four months of her pregnancy, she was not allowed to travel, if I had to list a great time for us, those would be them. My Dad was happy to have her home and she smiled. They took me to the park, and she took me to school, they argued over books in a good way. My sister Lorelai Leigh Mariano was born in October the year I was four. I had personally been hoping for a brother, but as my Dad held me up to the nursery and pointed her out, I was happy to have her, happy to have someone else in our family. Someone who would keep my Mom at home, but it just didn't work out that way. A month after Leigh was born, we dropped my Mom off at the airport and that was that.   
  
Leigh is an interesting kid, where I'm mostly like my Dad, Leigh is a perfect mixture of the two of them, she can be broody and dark and she can be happy and playful. She has the dark eyes that when you look deep into them you wonder about what type of mystery this tiny happy child could possible hold. When she was nine months old, my Dad sitting across the room, called to her: Leigh come here. She cocked her head at him, and said sternly: "Le-Le." and that's what we called her from then on.


	2. A Phone call from America

The phone rang, one rainy mid-afternoon, my Dad with year and half-old Le-Le on his hip, and a book in his hand, and the distillers playing in the background picked up.  
  
"'Lo?"  
  
There was a pause on the other end. "May I please speak to Rory?" It was an American voice, a familiar voice.  
  
"Hello Lorelai." Jess replied flatly.  
  
"Jess??" She cried, her voice rising.  
  
"Lorelai." He repeated.  
  
"I saw one of her articles, in the New York Times and it said that she was an overseas correspondent from the London Chronicle, I thought how many Mariano's could there be in London?"  
  
"More than you expected?"  
  
"I called some Gilmore, R's first just in case..." She trailed off.  
  
"Say it Lorelai, just in case I had left her." He paused. "Again. Jesus Christ! I was 17 Lorelai and I came back!"  
  
"Can I speak to her?"  
  
"No."  
  
Her voice wavered on the other end. "What..?'  
  
"She's not here, she's in Belarus. She'll be back next week."  
  
"Oh. What about.." She stopped for a second as if to remember my name. "What about Addicus, where is he?"  
  
"He's at school. I'm picking him up in about an hour."  
  
"Oh." The tension over the phone was growing as they both tried to think of reasons to get off the phone.  
  
"Daddy, juice." Le-Le whined throwing her arms around his neck.  
  
"Who's that?"  
  
"That's my daughter."  
  
"I have a granddaughter? You had another kid and didn't even tell me; then again, you moved out of the country and didn't tell me! Am I that horrible of a person that you had to completely leave me, lock me out of your lives?" She breathed in, with a realization that she had just become her mother.  
  
"What's her name?"  
  
"Lorelai, Lorelai Leigh, but we call her Le-Le."  
  
"Daddy!" Le-Le begged with more insistence.  
  
"Can you tell Rory, when she gets home, to call me please. My phone number is the same."  
  
"I'll do that."  
  
"Alright, bye Jess."  
  
"Bye Lorelai."  
  
I imagine he was probably rattled, perhaps angry, with himself, at Rory for running away in the first place, or sad for having been away from home for so long. When he came to pick me up at school, something was different. His hair was messy as if he had been running his fingers through it for hours, his hands were spotted with ink as if he couldn't think of anything to write and spun the pen between his fingers instead. He had Le-Le on his shoulders and he held my backpack and loosened my tie.  
  
"I heard from someone special today." He stated out of the blue half way home.  
  
"Mom?" I asked looking up at him, holding his hand, still in the stage of denial that I didn't realize their relationship had fallen almost completely apart.  
  
"Nope, Mom's still in Belarus, but I heard from your Grandma."  
  
I scratched my head, miffed. "I have a grandma?"  
  
I didn't really understand what was going on, as he explained to me that I actually had two grandmas. Both who lived in America and both whom I had never met before. To tell you the truth I wasn't interested at all. I asked him if we could go to the park, and we did.  
  
I slid down the slide and pushed Le-Le on the swings occasionally cutting my eyes over to my Dad sitting on the bench, a book on his lap, his eyes mutely following us, his mind clearly somewhere else. I didn't understand what was weighing so much on him, I smiled and waved. Hoping I could somehow cheer him up. He smiled back at me, waved back and came over, and just like that, he threw his moody broody mood out the window. At least in front of me. Later that week my Mom returned from her trip, in the car on the way home they talked politics, when we got home she threw her travelling case on the bed, hugged me, kissed Le-Le and went to work. Pouring over notes, getting the crinkle on her forehead that proved she was concentrating. My Dad shifted his weight from foot to foot.  
  
"Your mother called." He tried to say it off the cuff as if it was something that hadn't been bothering him.  
  
She turned around. "What?"  
  
"Lorelai, she called on Wednesday."  
  
"How did she find us?" She raised her eyebrows and looked at him wide-eyed.  
  
"One of your articles that got picked up by the New York Times, she 411'ed Mariano's living in London and got me."  
  
"I should call her."  
  
"That was her wish."  
  
Rory went back to her work, Jess put me to bed, and sometime between the time I went to bed and the time I woke up, Lorelai was called.  
  
It was raining the next day, when Dad set off to take me to school. We huddled under our umbrella, me splashing in puddles in my yellow rubber boots.  
  
"Guess what?"  
  
Always the energetic guesser, I responded. 'What?"  
  
"We are going on a trip."  
  
"With Mom?"  
  
He shrugged his shoulders. "Kind of. In two weeks Mom is taking a trip to Washington, which is where?"  
  
I looked at him belittling like. "It's in America."  
  
"Good. Mom's gonna go, and later you and me and Le-Le are going to fly to Connecticut and meet your Grandma, and my Uncle Luke in the town where Mom grew up and she's going to meet us there."  
  
Me, of course the energetic six year old, was much more excited about the plane ride and the salt and vinegar pretzels my Mom always gave me from the plane, than the impending family reunion.  
  
I wonder how much my Mom and Dad thought before deciding to take a trip back to Stars Hollow the place they had energetically moved halfway across the world to escape from. I imagine my Mother was looking forward to proving that she had become successful despite me, the illegitimate child, and my Dad, the bad boy boyfriend who almost knocked her life off track. Maybe she wanted to see her mother, a woman who had been her best friend and her confidant for 18 years. For my Dad, I don't know, the thought of making a seven-hour journey with two young children I am sure was not at all appetizing, as well as returning to a place where people still considered his actions that he had done as a seventeen year old boy as reasons to shun him. I think he went for my Mom, because he always loved her more that she loved him.  
  
Before we left, my Dad sat me down in my favourite chair and explained to me that we were going to visit Grandma.  
  
"Now what's our rule?" He asked me.  
  
"Always try to be nice." I replied. "Within reason." I added with a grin.  
  
"That's right, so if suddenly there is a middle aged woman with an American accent pinching your cheeks and hugging you, and I'm not doing a flying rugby tackle screaming 'Pervert', what does that mean?"  
  
"I have to be nice."  
  
Dad grinned at me, tousled me hair. "Within reason." 


	3. Airports, relatives and fights

_Warning: Anyone who can't stand an antagonistic approach of Rory should probably stop right now._

* * *

Rory left a week before us, an uneventful plane trip I'm sure. Unlike the way it was for my Dad. Thanks to in flight movies and large quantities of Swedish berries I was pretty much taken care of, I sat next to the window with my earphones on for five hours consuming endless amount of sugar. My Dad however found out that having someone, even someone who was only two, sitting on him at 30,000 feet, off and on for hours was not at all a fun experience. Le-Le soon found she hated flying, she was frightened and spent most of her time crawling on and off of my Dad's lap, while he tried to comfort her by stroking her brown hair and reading to her.

But it was when we hit the ground the trip really got fun. The line for customs was a mile long, I was feeling the long-term effects of a large bag of Swedish berries and jumping from one foot to another, Le-Le was knocked out and slumped over my Dad's shoulder. When we finally reached the front of the line, feeling victorious Dad produced his passport and Le-Le woke up.

America has interesting rules I soon found out. In order to be considered an American citizen, one needs to be either born in the United States, be declared an American citizen by the government or if born internationally to American parents have your parents declare you by the time you are six months old. Which covered my Dad obviously, and me, however it did not cover the small child running around in circles around my Dad's knees. My Father not expecting a trip to America in his near future did not register Le-Le, which meant that my two year old sister was a British citizen travelling under my father's American passport, and in the eyes of the moustached grim man wearing the customs uniform this was an illegal, (and near terrorist action). Of course, my sister on her recently woken up energetic status, and I on my sugar high excitement did not help at all. My sister hearing her name repeated several times by people she didn't know found it her job to re-educate him, but crossing the yellow line, tugging on his pants and telling him in a no nonsense tone "Le-Le."

An hour later, after the British embassy had been called, after the British embassy had faxed a temporary passport for my two-year-old terrorist threat sister, we left the customs line. My father was ready to rip his own hair out, so that when he finally emerged to the public airport he was not a happy man. Probably preferring to sit in our front room, with his kids in bed, with a pack of cigarettes and a bottle of Jack Daniels, then 3000 miles from home and meeting family after a six year hiatus. I, riding the cart and sitting nobly on top of the suitcases was feeling just fine. Lorelai and Luke were slumped on a bench near the entrance starring catatonically at the blue screen that stated our flight had landed nearly two hours ago, and secretly wondering in their heads if Jess had been the irresponsible kid again and just not come.

Jess had rolled our cart right up them and it was only when he stood in front of the blue screen that they recognized him.

"Jess!" Luke stood up in a hurry. I've seen pictures of my Dad at seventeen; he had bright eyes, carefully moussed hair, and a practiced scowl. At 24, I suppose to Luke and Lorelai he looked different. He had shaggy hair, a neater wardrobe and a noticeable softer and quieter voice, with little hints of an Englishman.

"Hi."

"Hi." Lorelai replied taking it in.

"Hi." Luke stated.

"Hi." I waved from my post on the suitcases.

"Hi." Le-Le cried out a tone higher than anyone really liked.

The three of them stood in an awkward circle.

"This is, Addy." He gestured to me, and I waved again, suddenly shy.

"And this is Le-Le."

"Addy, this is your Grandma, and this is your great Uncle Luke."

I bit my lip and looked around. "Good to meet you Grandma, Uncle Luke."

Lorelai looked at me and her eyes softened. "He sounds so cute!" Taking three quick steps and near knocking me off the suitcase as she pulled me into a hug. Just like that, our awkward group turned into a happy re-union airport family. Luke hugged Jess, Lorelai hugged me, and Lorelai pranced over to Le-Le and fussed over the fourth Lorelai. Luke hugged me; Jess and Lorelai eyed each other warily and shook hands.

Certain things stick out about that visit to Stars Hollow. The first is Luke's diner, sitting on his counter waving and talking to all of the quirky residents and eating three slices of pie, before my Dad discovered me. The second is sitting in the gazebo with my Dad reading while we waited for my Mom's rent-a-car to show up. The third was meeting my great grandparents, visiting them in their big house, Emily fussing over us and demanding to know every little thing and Richard standing back, serious, but with a smile. I walking up to him, reaching only his waist, looking up at him serious and stating.

"I'm Addicus."

"I'm your great Grandpa." He responded equally sombre. Just like that, we started to laugh.

The fourth and most distinctively memorable was the fight. Such a standout moment in my memory that I would always remember every little thing. It's my earliest horrible memory, the first day I saw my parents in a new light. Le-Le and I had been sitting in Lorelai's living room while my Dad was upstairs finishing off his review on Lorelai's computer, when Mom came in and went up. Perhaps it was the tension of family, of actually spending time with each other, of being back in Stars Hollow, Connecticuit, population 9975, what ever it was, it started out quiet and got louder.

"--What the hell are you talking about Rory?"

"You know what! The minute you stop treating me like I'm the fucking villain in this story."

"Then who is?"

Rory was quiet.

"Just say it!! I'm the villain; I'm the bloody evil guy. Why?! Because 'I' got you pregnant, because 'I' ruined your dreams, because 'I' left you!? Wake the fuck up Rory, we got pregnant, you and I together, as far as I can tell your bloody dreams are back on track to the expensive of everything else, and as for me leaving you, I was 17 years old, you told me you were pregnant and I came back, and I have always been here since."

"The expensive of everything else, what do you mean by that?"

"Don't be so ignorant. About how you don't know your kids and they don't know you. You don't know me! You know about the crisis in eastern Europe and starvation in Africa, congratulations it's a real life accomplishment."

"How dare you? I know my children---"

"--What's Addy's teacher's name?"

"I know them.--"

"--What's Leigh's favourite food--"

"I don't hear you complaining when you're using my pay check."

"I have a job; I have a pay check and excuse me if I use your money to feed your kids that you don't give a damn about!"

"Shut the hell up Jess."

"Just answer me one question Rory."

"Shut up--"

"One question."

"Fine. FINE!"

"If you could go back, and choose about Le-Le and Addy would you still have them?"

"What kind of question is that, No! No! NO! I would have been happy having you gone, I would have gone away to University and I wouldn't have to put up with you or them! You're the one who pushed me into having Le-Le in the first place!"

"That's right, get out how you really feel."

"Don't make yourself the good guy. Like you wouldn't pick another way."

"No I wouldn't, and do you know why I pushed you into keeping Le-Le, because damnit Rory you just don't get it! Do you know why? Because I love them and you don't!!!!"

Sometimes near the beginning of the fight Le-Le had climbed in my lap, and halfway through when Lorelai walked in we were huddled in a corner, trying to cover our ears, and I was trying not to cry. Rory stormed down the stairs and Jess was following suit in a horrible contest on who could make the most noises and scream the most curses when they saw us on the floor, Lorelai desperately trying to comfort us and casting them both death looks.

They stopped dead. Rory looked from side to side.

She shook her head. "Fuck." She exhaled, and slammed the door behind her.

Jess stood in the middle of the floor, looking at my tears, looking as Le-Le gripped me with her little hands for dear life, her cheeks tear stained and her bottom lip still trembling.

"Oh Christ, I'm sorry."


	4. Addy's growing up montage

What happened in the aftermath I don't remember quite as much. I've been told that Jess and Lorelai sat in the kitchen in defensive positions. Lorelai, her respect for her daughter shattered, trying to still stick up for her, while Jess tried to tell her who her daughter was. They didn't see eye-to-eye, and sometime after I was in my bed, trying to think happy thoughts, my Dad put on his coat and walked out of the house. Wondering the same haunts he used to when he was a teenager, smoking and drinking from a bottle he had bought at the twenty-four hour mini mart. Luke discovered him on the bridge, his shoes dangling in the water, a cloud of smoke over his head and well on his way to being hammered out of his gourd.

Luke having been a briefed of the situation when he had come home to Lorelai, sat down gently beside him.

"She doesn't love me and she doesn't love Addy or Le-Le, and I don't know why, what did I do to chase her so far away?"

Luke didn't know, Luke didn't know the 24 year old man in front of him, he known a young man, a teenager who had the same name and looked similar, but this man was different he was more responsible, more open, Luke couldn't put his finger on it. He was a father.

Luke rubbed Jess' shoulder, and took a gulp from the bottle sitting on the deck.

"I can't say Jess, people change and you and Rory have changed. I read her articles, I can't believe the person writing with such precision, and emotion is the same little girl I fed donuts to in my diner. I see her in real life and she's not the same either, she's less like her Mom, more unhappy, more serious. You, are different, I didn't recognize you at the airport, I didn't hear from you in six years, and in that six years I tried to forget that you were out there somewhere with a kid. I expected you to be the same; I don't know what you've been through practically raising Addy and Leigh by yourself. You have grown apart." Jess took another swig of the bottle and dug in his pocket for another cigarette.

"A thousand times I wanted to call you. A thousand times I hesitated. I-- I don't know anything." He rubbed his head, ran his fingers through his hair.

"Maybe tomorrow things will be better, being here having to deal with family its stressful, maybe tomorrow things will be different."

I'm sure it wouldn't surprise you, that in the morning things we not different. In the morning, Jess sat at the kitchen table nursing his hangover with a large cup of coffee as he and Rory glared at each other. Eye locked in pure hatred over toast and eggs. She left later in the afternoon to return to the Democratic Convention in Washington.

Three days later, we left Stars Hollow. A week after that Mom came home, they tried to make the best of it, they wrote their respective articles, Jess read his books, and Rory went to the office. After the article was published, she went off to Poland on another mission of perfection journalism and she never came back. She came back to England, she published her articles, she travelled the world, but she never came back to our apartment in Islington, she never came back to Le-Le or me. She never sent cards, or called. Just like that, my Mom went to Poland and fell off the face of the earth as far as we were concerned. I don't think its mean to say I didn't miss her; everything was the same as it always had been. She was never there. But there were moments, moments that I think everyone has, where life seems dark and sad, and all you want to do is climb in your Mom's lap and have her tell you, everything will be okay. Despite my Dad being unconditionally there for me, he could not be my Mom in those moments and in those few moments that were far between I missed her, with an ache in my heart. But for every moment I yearned for my Mom and was left alone and sad, there were fifty with my Dad that left my life light and happy. He has an easy smile, a good ear for listening and always something that is worthwhile to learn.

My Dad took a weekly review with the Guardian to make ends meet and became a leader for the English people on what books were worthy of reading and which weren't. Little excerpts of his reviews appeared on the back of dust covers and paperback novels, displaying below: Jess Mariano, The Guardian. He too, in his own way, had become a success. He read for a living and he didn't want anymore than that.

In the meantime, I grew up. I went from being a short six year old kid with cropped brown hair and eyes that were too big, to being a sombre eight year old who would rather read than make friends, who swapped letters with his great grandfather, and who continued to do so, until the sombre man with the bow tie died from a heart attack at the age of 71, who's best friend was his Dad. To a serious ten year old who loved to play football, who made friends kicking the ball around in the park, who got his first crush on a girl and who read at night underneath the covers with a flashlight. At twelve, I was a moody kid who loved to escape. Escape school, by wondering the streets and sitting in random parks reading and listening to music, who would kick a football up against a wall for hours just to hear it pounding. At twelve, I was angry, angry at the world. I was aggressive and unenthusiastic but I guess that's all a part of growing up. My Dad left me alone when I needed to be alone and was there when I needed him even if it was only to watch the world cup on TV, or talk about books or crank up music louder than our neighbours enjoyed. My Dad was still my best friend.

I looked back on my life, I looked up my Mom's address and went to her place and peeked in the windows and to find no one there, barley a trace of life, other than the mounting stack of mail sitting under the mail slot. I never went back. I wrote voraciously and didn't care about proper grammar, didn't care about much that constituted as rules.

At 14, I had grown into myself, if that's possible, I grew out my hair, lived with my ear phones around my neck and a readily supply of music, I had a backpack full of books that weren't for school, I wore my uniform tie loose, and pants that were too big for me, I fell in love with girls at first sight, but were too shy to talk to them. I had a group of tight knit mates that gathered to sit on the brick wall at my school, smoke and discuss all things important. Namely footy, music, and girls. We laughed, and I smiled, we drank stolen cans of beer on weekends and wondered around the streets of Islington, talking too loud and a little bit drunk. Some called us punks and we wore it as a badge of honour. My Dad and I fought, we fought as father and son about marks at school, the moral character of my friends and drinking, and we fought as best friends about the best Kerouac novel, British punk music and the girl I refused to ask out. I was a teenager and he was my Dad.

All the while Le-Le was there, not in the background by any means, for that girl is not meant to blend into the background. She's bombastic, loud and happy. I love her, she's my sister and I would do anything for her. When she starts dating, I'll have to harass her boyfriends because they'll have to know that when it comes to Le-Le its strictly a 'break her heart, I'll break your neck' basis, but then again I just may have to get in line because I'm sure my Dad will be willing to crack a few skulls in the name of his little girl. Le-Le is passionate about everything that she does, like our whole family she loves to read; she'll spend hours cuddled up in a papisan chair with books of all genres, to best sellers, to Jane Austen, to 'the Lord of the Rings' and 'Harry Potter.' But what she loves best is dance. When she was seven my Dad took her to see the Broadway production of _Cats._ She came home, wanting to become a dancer and she hasn't changed her mind yet. She'll dance in our front room when the light is pouring in, she'll dance glowing and watch her shadow and imagine that she's on the stage. She loves ballet, and jazz, and of course like a Mariano can name every 'important' punk band circa 1973-1979. She's good I'll give her that, and she's going to dance for an audience one day.

When I was 14, we moved, moved away from the house we'd lived for 11 years, away from the country I called my home, away from my friends, and away from my school. My Dad was offered a job, by the New York Times to be one of their top reviewers, to be one of the leader reviewers in the world. The offer had come before; he had always denied it, always stayed where he was, pleased being who and where he was.

One day driving back home from a business meeting in inner London, on a curvy dark street he was broad sided by a lorry, he spun out of control and came to a stop a centimetre from the centre lane. He told me later, had he put his foot on the break a second later, turned the wheel a second slower, he would have been struck in a head on collision by a silver Acura with a silver haired businessman talking into his mobile and going seventy km/h around a corner he couldn't he see. My Dad's thoughts as he spun, came to a stop, spoke to the police, watched his car being carted off to a garage, as he caught a cab home were on Le-Le and I. If he died, he pondered, what would happen to us? Would we become wards of the state, or shipped off to relatives in a far distant Stars Hollow whom we only knew, through the occasional letter and Christmas present. Who knew nothing about us, and vice versa. It chilled my Dad to the bones; he hired a solicitor and wrote a will. However, that didn't calm him, so that when the New York Times again made their offer, he accepted on a trial basis.

We moved against my wishes, against Le-Le's wishes. Tempers were high and my Dad and I didn't speak for nearly a week, but finally he sat me down and explained his reasoning, recounted his near death experience, and told me he was putting the majority of our things in storage, just in case we wanted to come back. Just in case we hated it.

We still got on the plane with less than amicable terms, Le-Le trying to do her best to keep us happy, sitting between us. Assuring us, and stating all the great things that could come of moving to America.

Looking back forth between us, she patted our knees and said. "It could be a total Kerouac experience."

I didn't really listen. I suppose it became obvious when again the three of us stood in the Hartford airport awkward with a cart of luggage looking at Lorelai and Luke and Lorelai took one look at me, in my shaggy black hair, and my dark eyes starring ruthlessly at them, and stated:

"Good god Jess, he's you." My Dad and I took one look at each other and burst out laughing. Le-Le eyeing us suspiciously, to see whether or not we were happy or just crazy. It still wasn't easy, living in Luke's small apartment, feeling as if we were living on top of each other.


	5. Talk over water

_Sorry for the wait, but here is the end of Part 1. Part 2 will be up by next week._

_If you enjoy it leave a review._

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My great grandmother patiently told my Father that I was much too intelligent to go to a public school, and thus I became the second person in my family to attend Chilton, on a check written from Emily's check book. I stick out there, my accent, my hair, my love for books that were considered less than reputable by the teaching staff. I sit alone at lunch, and wander the corridors alone.

One day wandering the empty halls, wishing to be anyone else, I stopped and looked at the graduation pictures of long past, and the slightly distant past. There she was, smiling with the gold ribbons around her neck. She looked happy, successful, and like the world was at her fingertips. But I know that at that moment as she was smiling with the cap and gown for the camera, she already knew she was going to have me. She knew that I was going to come and ruin her life. I found myself coming past that picture again and again, taking long ways to my class, to stop and look at it for a second, to stare into the eyes of the girl, I had never met. I began to wonder what she said to the graduating class, as she got up on that podium, knowing that every person there had plans, and a future and knowing that hers were about to take a nosedive. It bothered me so much, that I looked it up in the last graduating copy of the Franklin 2003. There is was, black and white, word for word. I think it perhaps made me understand a little bit better, her sheer blind ambition.

I guess I'm left with three options, I can be like my Mom and despite obstacles keep trying with blind ambition and become the valedictorian, I can be like my Dad I can skip classes, smoke outside the gym and throw everything away and hope that somehow I'd be able to accomplish something, or I can pick my own way, a mixture of the two. I still haven't decided. In the meantime, I'm doing my work and being the person everyone at my school loves to hate.

Living in Stars Hollow is hard, it's difficult to have people I don't know come up to me and state what a lovely girl my Mother was. Difficult going to my grandmothers house where there are pictures of her. I think it's the worse for Le-Le, she could probably strain her memory and not come up with one memory of our Mom, she was barley two when she left. Some days I feel sorry for her, because she never got to see the high points, she never got to see my Dad wake me up in the morning with a smile on his face, because that day was an 'airport holiday' where he would speed to the airport and we would wonder around the airport for an hour or more waiting for her to arrive. Le-Le will never know the time Mom and I had when she was pregnant, a time when I think she truly loved me. Sometimes I'm jealous of her, because I don't think Le-Le lays awake at night wondering why your Mom would chose to leave you, because for her it's the way it's always been and my Dad always candy coated the truth for her. For Le-Le Dad has always been there, she never needed anybody else. I have the good memories of Mom and the bad memories of Mom and they both hurt some days.

Those days are closer between living in Stars Hollow. Strain from being uprooted from my life, from school, from ghosts of my Mom whirled around leading into a fight between my Dad and I, that left Le-Le fleeing to Grandma's and Dad and I screaming at each other until our voices were hoarse and then some. I screamed things I didn't mean, and words I never thought I would use in pure hatred towards my Dad. I couldn't stop all the hate coming out of me, and he got it all. I stormed out and pounded the streets of Stars Hollow, smoking with a vengeance and listening to my music with the headphones cranked all the way up. Finally, I sat down on the bridge, dangling my feet in the water, still angry and trying not to feel guilty about the things I had said to him.

"Hey." In a moment, he was beside me, his feet dangling, pulling out a loose cigarette from the package beside me.

"Tomorrow I tell you you're not allowed to smoke." He stated exhaling smoke.

I nodded.

"I'm sorry Addy. I'm sorry for moving you here, for taking you away from your friends and your school and away from where things make sense."

"No, it's not you; it's just everything building up. At school, I feel so alone, all the kids are judgemental and rich, and they don't care about real things. They care about what type of car their parents money will buy, what they have to write in their essays to be get the right marks to get into Harvard, whose the most popular, who's the best. I don't want any of those things. Here is, difficult, I was taking orders for Luke and this overly large woman started fussing over me and how I talked, and all of the sudden she says, oh your Rory's boy. I wanted to scream at her, no I'm not. I'm sick of running into Mom everywhere I go in this town."

Dad exhaled. "I know what you mean, here I am 32 years old, a successful journalist, a single father of two great kids." He paused gave me crooked smile. "most of the time, and I come to this town and I feel like I'm 17 again. Still corrupting the town princess, still ruining her life. But it's good to be near Luke again, you guys have been getting along now that you're working there a bit?"

I shrugged. "Yeah." I liked Luke, I liked working in his diner taking orders and making the occasional hamburger.

"Dad, tell me the truth, all of the things I never heard, the real truth."

He told me. I wish I could tell you that this story will end in happily ever after. I can't say for sure. We may stay in Stars Hollow we may not. One day Le-Le may dance on Broadway, next to her headshot in the program, she'll thank her Father for always being there for her, her dance instructors, the original cast of _Cats_ circa London April 2015, she may even thank me, one person will not grace the names on her program. Dad and I will be there when the curtains raise and the first to give a standing ovation. One person will always not be there. I don't know what I'll be, I don't know what the future holds for me but I know that whatever is out there for me, My Dad will always be there to catch me if I ask him, he will never write me off, or not be there for me. Because were family. The three of us, but I will always wonder even though now I know all of the things she said, why she didn't want me.


	6. Part 2: Protecting LeLe

The days continued to go by, the sun set and it rose and I went about my life. But when I was alone at school, when I was sitting with my family, working with Luke, when I was alone with my music and my notebook my mind was never far from that conversation. That conversation about the mother I felt I never knew. The truth of my life and who I came from. Those words said in hushed tones over the water of Stars Hollow sat in my heart. In a way I felt free, because I knew I had my Dad. I still felt alone, and angry and downright pissed off. But I kept at it, I wanted to make my life work. That still did not prepare me to come home from school one day, partly changed in jeans and my dress shirt and my tie hanging loosely around my neck. I walked straight home, to find Luke swamped with teenagers coming for coffee and donuts after school to discuss all the things I didn't care about, to find middle agers coming for Danishes to discuss loftier things. Luke looked at me over the counter with eyes that said: Please Help Me. Luke looked on the verge of madness, so I grabbed an order pad and went to work.

Living in a small town, sometimes feels so strange to me after living in London all my life, to know that great historical monuments, some of the worlds most famous art, are just an underground ride away. You could live your whole life in London and never see the same person on the street twice. Stars Hollow however is not like that. You see the same people over and over again, whether you want to or not. Its strange the thoughts that go through your head when you are approached with something you don't expect. I was standing there with my order pad and my pen, I had just finished saying: What can I get you? When I looked down and came eye to eye with startling blue eyes I knew. There she was, thirty-two years old and still looking the same. I flicked my eyes over to the corner booth and wondered if this was how my Dad felt when he came face to face with Jimmy for the first time.

"Can I get a Danish and a cup of coffee please." Anger has a strange taste, I could feel it reverberating off me, I could smell it, I could taste it on my tongue. It tasted like blood, it tasted like disappointment, it tasted like your heart falling into your stomach. I'm not sure if it made me angry or sad that she didn't recognize me. How many people in Stars Hollow have English accents and look very similar to your ex-boyfriend? She didn't even look up at me. She was looking at a notebook instead, her work, the story of my young life.

"No."

She looked up at me inquisitively.

"Excuse me?"

"No you cannot have a cup of coffee and a Danish as a matter of fact you can't have anything, so get the fuck out." I was angry, I was so angry. She didn't come to this town to see me or Le-Le, she didn't even know we were here and why would she? My hands were shaking, and my eyes starred with veracity I had never known.

Her eyes almost looked hurt. "I know the owner here, I've been coming here since before you were born."

"Yeah you were, I know. The owner here, is my uncle, and I'm saying get the fuck out."

The shock of realization nearly knocked her over. "Addy?"

"Time for redemption is long past Rory." In three long strides, I had grabbed my backpack and was out the door, still hearing the bells ringing in my ears, and the tone of her voice when she said my name. Disbelief, confusion, not one drop of guilt.

I knew Rory was here, Luke was probably finding out at the same moment I was pounding across the streets of Stars Hollow, Dad would know in moments and Lorelai must know, because she had to be the reason Rory was here. She had come home to see her Mom, not her kids. I wonder if Lorelai knew in advance, or if Rory had just dropped by on one of her frequent jaunts around the world. There was however one person who did not know that Rory was here and I wanted it to stay that way. Le-Le. She spent her afternoons at Miss Patty's, dancing and hearing the tales of Broadway. She was discussing _RENT_ with Miss Patty.

"Le-Le! Get over here." I hissed at her, my heart was still pounding and I just wanted to get out of this town and I wanted to take Le-Le with me, before she got hurt. She bounded over to me, a smile on her face.

"Hey Addy."

"Leigh get your coat, we have to go somewhere."

Her eyebrows cocked. "Where?"

"Just get your coat."

She had barely an arm in her coat, her backpack still slung over her arm, when I grabbed her.

"Addy, what is going on? Is something wrong with Dad?" She asked me.

I didn't say a thing, I just brooded with anger and frustration boiling in my heart.

I had never wanted to leave anywhere, more than I wanted to leave Rory behind in that moment, I paid for two bus tickets with my Dad's credit card and Le-Le and I left. I didn't look back, Le-Le did.

"Does Dad know where we are going?" She was starring out the window and fiddling with the string on her jacket.

"No! He doesn't." I snapped. I could feel her body sliding closer to the window, further from me.

Her voice was soft, assuring, grown up. "I'm not stupid Addy, why can't you tell me, I'm not a little girl."

I shook my head. "Yes you are." She was my little sister, she was a little girl to me, and I wanted to protect her.

"Were making a stop-over in Hartford we could just ring Dad, tell him we're alive."

"He knows we're alive."

"What are you running from?" She twirled her hair in her indexed finger and looked at me with eyes so serious, I wanted to tell her, but at the same moment, I wanted her to stay innocent.

"Stars Hollow."

We arrived in New York as dusk was approaching and the anger I had felt in my heart the whole bus ride, turned to fear. What was I doing in this city, running away from my Mom?

Le-Le was huddled next to me, afraid of the people bustling past us, afraid of the night.

"What are we going to do?"

"I don't know." I didn't know, I had no idea, I looked around at the busy streets, at the yellow cabs, at the fading autumn leaves blowing on the sidewalk, smelt the pollution and heard the noise. This was my birthplace and I didn't know it.

We walked, on the sidewalks with the last rays of day behind us.

"I want to call Dad." Le-Le paused hooking her thumbs into the straps of her backpack. "Or we could call Dad's mom. Grandma." She whispered in a low tone.

"No. Dad has his reasons for us never meeting her, she hasn't spoken to him in 15 years, besides I don't even know her last name." I knew those reasons, I knew the life my Dad had as a child. A litany of men walking in and out of his life, his Mom drinking, his Mom never being there for him.

Le-Le looked up at the skyscrapers glistening orange in the sunset.

She smiled over at me. "it's a pretty city."

I wasn't seeing a pretty city, I was seeing a scary city, a city growing dark, I was seeing crime charts in my head, and a country that is way too liberal about gun possession.

"How about we go see a movie?" I just needed sometime to clear my head.

Le-Le was halfway to saying yes, when a sly look crossed her face.

"We're in New York City, how about Broadway?"

It would shut her up, it would make her happy. "You are the one that is going to take the blame when Dad sees his credit card bill." I stated.

"So we are going to see Dad again."

I nodded. I guess so. We went to go see _STOMP_, Le-Le loved it, she looked so truly happy with a smile on her face, but whenever I found myself kind of enjoying myself, her face would loom over me. That woman, the woman I never wanted to see.

The lights of (off) Broadway were shining when we came out, the city was still alive, yellow cabs crawling over the road, high society ladies in their Thursday best, beggars looking pathetic leaning against pillars holding miserable signs.

We squeezed into a phone booth, to call Dad.

He sounded panicked he sounded scared.

"Addy? Jesus Christ Addicus, where the hell are you, were is Le-Le?" He haden't called me Addicus since an interesting event with a friend and a bottle of whiskey.

"Le-Le is fine."

"Is she there, I want to hear her, know that she's okay!" His voice kept getting louder, higher, faster.

I nudged Le-Le who was starring at the graffiti in the phone booth, tucking her hands across her ribs afraid to touch anything.

"Hi Dad!" She called out.

I could hear him give a sigh of relief.

"What the hell are you doing Addy?"

"You know." I protested.

There was an eerie silence on the line.

I put my hand over the receiver. "Le-Le wait outside."

She protested feebly, but in the end stood outside glaring at me fiercely.

"Is it safe to assume this is about her?" My Dad's voice said on the other line, he sounded defeated, he sounded sad.

"I don't want Le-Le to see her, she doesn't deserve it."

"You're in the middle of a huge city, at night, with no where to go, I think that is a bigger risk to Le-Le than Rory making a re-appearance." I liked how he called her Rory, I liked how he didn't refer to her as my mother. He wasn't angry, he knew where I was coming from, he was just worried as hell.

"Fine, I'll put her on a bus." I hoped that maybe Rory would be gone, off to discover a new threat of terrorism, a new presidential campaign, a coup in a third world country, I wanted her gone.

"What about you?"

"Yeah." I hung up the phone, and walked out to Le-Le.

"Well?" She asked twisting her hair with her index finger.

"You're going home." She smiled, I could see her face relax, she wanted to go home.

I put Le-Le on a bus that night, a connecting bus to Stars Hollow, she looked at me incuriously when I didn't buy myself a ticket.

"Addy? Aren't you coming?"

I shook my head. "Leigh, no matter what she says, she doesn't love you." Or me for that matter, her bus pulled out of the station, and I walked out into the City.


	7. Pandora's box

Sorry this update took so long, there should be another up soon.

Please R/R ;)

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I didn't walk out into a dangerous city by myself to spite Rory, or even my Dad. I couldn't go home until I had sorted myself out, figured out who I was, and what the hell it was I was doing with my life. I couldn't figure out those things in Stars Hollow, and New York just happened to be there. One visit from a wayward mother and a bus ride away. I didn't know where I was going, or what was going to happen to me. 

I ended up in Central Park, hiding myself amongst the trees and listening to the distant sound of the City, smoking and thinking. I don't lucidly remember much I thought about that night, but I knew two things: I wasn't my parents, I didn't have to act like them, I didn't have to be like them, I was an individual and nothing either of them said could possibly change that. They had created me, they had shaped who I was, some of my interests, the way I acted, but at the end of the day I was Addicus Mariano and every thought that came into my head was my own, my responsibility and all mine. The second, was I wanted to be home. It took all of my self control not to run to the bus station, or even the nearest phone. I had never missed home so much, Dad, Le-Le, I missed them. But I stayed because I had to stay. If I had gone home in the middle of the night, I would have gone home to the same unresolved problems.

I woke up cuddled next to a pine tree, wrapped in a prep school blazer, with a middle aged homeless and rather drunk man standing over me his hands on me, perhaps he wanted my wallet, perhaps he wanted something else. I didn't want to know. I didn't stick around to know.

I got coffee and walked to the bus station and got on the first bus to Stars Hollow, no regrets, I had done what I had to do. I was glad I had done it. My Dad was sitting on the bench in front of the bus station, his mobile clutched loosely in his hand, his eyes closed, sleeping. I stood in front of him, wondering how long he had been sitting there, how long he had been dreaming up worse case scenarios for me, waiting for me to come home.

"Dad." He jolted awake, blinking his eyes and looking at me with his mouth open.  
"Addy?" He asked with a sigh of relief.  
I smiled uneasily, waiting for the happiness to break, for the anger to set in.  
"Jesus Christ, let me hug you, and then I'm going to kick your ass." He reached out and pulled me in, touching my hair and tapping his fingers on my back, as if you to reassure himself that it was really me.  
"Oh Christ Addy when Le-Le got off that bus and you weren't there. I wanted to run over to Lorelai's house and kill her myself." He had his hands resting heavily on my shoulders, starring right at me.  
"You spent the night in New York."  
I nodded, and rubbed my eyes. "Central Park."  
"I've done that myself, more than once, not the best place to be." He looked at me in all seriousness and I swore he looked right through me. "You get everything worked out?"  
"Yeah."  
The short ride home was eerily silent, he didn't say a word, and nor did I.

I dropped my bag, by the door, and my Dad standing in the middle of the room, looked at me sternly.  
"Sit." There was a look in his eyes, a look I rarely saw, it was a serious look. I knew he wasn't angry at me for why I had done it, but I could see in that look that he was sure as hell angry at me for how I went about it.

"Where's Le-Le?" I asked innocently, attempting to prolong my fate. A proper tongue lashing was not a pleasant experience, and I didn't want to hear it. Because every time I did, my Dad always ended up saying the things that were true, and it always hurt to hear the real truth.  
"She's at Emily's."  
"You sent her to Emily's?" I asked with a more sarcastic and incredulous tone in my voice than I had intended, considering the situation I was in.   
"Yes, sit." It was not a voice to be messed with.  
I sat, in a big hurry.  
He sat opposite from me, and leaned in.  
"So there is a few things, I'll start off with."  
I nodded weakly, my father reviewed books for a living, and he certainly knew how to review big mistakes with a vengeance.

"Number one, your sister." I knew there was two ways I could take this, I could sit and take it, or I could argue and take it. But hell, I was a Mariano, I wasn't taking this sitting down.  
"She's fine." I pointed out.  
My Dad, looked at me with eyes that said, don't do that.

"Yes, perhaps she is fine, but that does not excuse the fact that you took a ten year old, into New York City at night! I know what's out there Addy, and you know what's out there. Le-Le does not, she's ten years old, she lives in her own little world, do you know the things that could have happened to her?" He wasn't screaming, but he was looking me straight in the eyes, with a stern look, and I knew he was right.

"She's fine. Do you think she would be any better off here, with Rory around? She didn't even know me Dad, Leigh knows what she looks like, can you imagine if she went up to her, and Rory just fucking brushed her off!"

"I get what you're saying Addy, I do. But at the same time, Le-Le is not going to get raped, or kidnapped, or sold into the sex trade in Stars Hollow. She's not going to see Rory, Addy, I promise." His mind must have been racing the whole time we were gone to come up with getting sold into the sex trade, which I'm pretty sure only happens in Asia.

I opened my mouth to say something else, to challenge him, but I couldn't, I'd put my little sister at risk, I'd brought her to danger, and for that I deserved to be held by the ceiling with hooks, because I was supposed to look out for her, and I guess that's what I thought I was doing. But I was wrong.

"I'm sorry."  
"I know."  
"Just because you apologized does not mean we are done Addicus." His eyes only softened a little bit. I knew from the way he was standing, he was just getting started.

I sat back in my chair, I had enough experience to know things were about to get ugly.

"What about you?"

"What about me?" I shot back at him.

"Did you even stop, did you even think for one moment what could have happened to you?"

I opened my mouth to say something, but apparently he was asking me one of those hypothetical questions, as he just kept talking, his voice raising.

"So Rory arrives, who has successfully avoided you for 8 years, and you are a little angry. But did you ever think that there could have been a better way to do this, other than run away with your little sister in tow?"

I considered it for a second, deciding in my mind, how angry I wanted him to get, how much energy I had to scream at him. How much I wanted to avoid talking about all the things that could have possibly happened to me. Realizing then how stupid I had been to think that I had sorted anything out about myself. So I hit him with the low blow.

I smiled a little.

"What Dad? Like father like son." My voice was full of bitterness.

He stopped dead in his pacing. He turned to me, his face a little shocked, a little angry.

"No Addy, like mother like son. I don't know what the hell you've heard but I am not the one that fucking runs away in this family. If I had been the one running, you would have been raised by Lorelai, your sister wouldn't have existed, and your mother, your fucking mother, would still be a world famous journalist! I'm not the fucking one running! Who has been the one that has always been here for you? And who has been the one who has never been in your life? Who was the one that dragged her away from the abortion clinic? Who was the one who fucking left you? Because goddamn it Addy, it wasn't me, so don't ever, ever, say something like that to me again!" An eerie silence filled the kitchen, the air felt thick with conflict. My Dad stood unmoving in the middle of the kitchen, grinding his teeth, his eyes boring into me, just daring me to say something back at him. Pandora's box was at our feet and I didn't have the guts to open it.

Yet there was something he had opened up, and I had to know the answer.

"Was it.. For me at the abortion clinic?"

"No Addy, it wasn't for you, it was for Le-Le." His voice was a drastic change, from the angry one that had been screaming at me just a few moments ago. He almost sounded as if he was giving up, he sounded defeated, he sounded sad.

"Well that's that. Lets go get your sister." I think he originally had more to say to me, more irresponsibility on my part to shove in my face. But I think he knew that neither of us could stay there with the things he had said still bouncing off the walls.

I got up silently and we left.


	8. The Fourth Lorelai

_Sorry for the endless plugging of __Cats! I'm a sucker for Andrew Lloyd Weber. I hope I didn't make Le-Le too mature for her age, I think any child of Jess and Rory would be mature and intelligent._

_Hope you like it. R/R :)_

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The drive to Hartford was silent. Silent as a father and son listening to the Clash, and trying to successfully avoid eye contact can be. There was a lot of rustling, quick head turns, and a tad bit of humming. Nothing that even breached the idea of actual conversation, or the amount of conflicts that had rumbled between us.

We pulled up at Emily's and rang the bell, and as per usual we were met with the random maid that seemed to change like clockwork every other weekend. Emily and Le-Le sauntered into view, both with large smiles. Smiles that made me, and from the look on his face, my Dad feel a tad bitter, we were not ready for smiles quite yet.

But unlike me, for my Dad this was all part of the fun burden of parenthood, so he smiled.

"Did you have a good time?"

Le-Le nodded, always full of energy, always full of cheer. "Awesome, _Cats!_ is coming to New York City and Grandma is gonna take me."

"Because there may be differences between the American and British version." Cut in Emily.

"And its always good to check." Le-Le finished.

Dad and I nodded mutely.

"Addy would you like to come? A young man could always do with some cultural background."

I shook my head. I didn't tell her that Le-Le had listened to the soundtrack, and watched the video recording of _Cats!_ so many times that the word "Mistoffelee's" made me feel ready to puke, and that if that was cultural background I had enough.

We were half way down the long winding driveway, when Le-Le leaned in between us from the backseat put a hand on both of our shoulders and said in all seriousness.

"So how about we cut the crap?"

Both mine and my Dad's head swung around so fast I feared for the car currently reversing.

"What?" My Dad asked, turning his eyes back to the road.

"I know both you and Addy like to put me in the little girl category. But I'm not. And I know what's going on." Before either of us could reject she continued talking.

"No one told me I just know. So that leaves you with two choices. You can drive me to Grandma's and I can talk to her. Or we can drive home and I can walk over to Grandma's and talk to her."

I cleared my throat, perhaps to avoid choking on my own tongue. My mind swirled for reasons other than Rory that would make Le-Le want to go to Grandma's.

"Talk to who?" Dad asked innocently, echoing the move I was about to make.

Le-Le rolled her eyes and with all the practice of a Mariano said.

"Didn't I already say cut the crap? I want to go to Grandma's and talk to Mom."

The word itself hit the car like a bombshell. I could almost feel the car rocking from side to side. But I think that was just me and my emotions as I silently derailed. Nobody in our family said the word Mom. Is was simply "Your mother" or "Rory". Almost like there was some kind of unspoken rule, that she didn't deserve it.

I had the urge to turn around and replay for Le-Le all the reasons we didn't need her, the word abortion kept fliting in and out of my head like a warning bell. But Le-Le was an individual, she was strong minded, and unique. And I couldn't tell her what to do if I tried and somehow I knew telling a ten year old girl that she was a mistake that was almost aborted would be a catastrophic mistake on my behalf. Le-Le was happy and I wanted her kept that way, even if it meant kicking ass, my own if need be.

My Dad nodded. "Fine."

The drive fell silent again.

In the final moments pulling into Lorelai and Luke's house I prayed that an urgent international affair had swept Rory away from Stars Hollow. I prayed for assassination, military dictatorship and communism. But I knew that my prayers had gone unheeded the minute I saw Lorelai's face as Le-Le marched up the front steps and rang the bell.

It wasn't something I couldn't protect her from, it was something Jess couldn't protect her from, it was one of those things that seemed hard to accept. That Le-Le was growing up and we had to let her go out there and get her heartbroken all on her own. I worried for her spirit, as she leapt into that new world with no abandon at all.

"Hi Grandma, I came to see my Mom." Her voice was just the way it always was, not a hint of fear or apprehension, but maybe that was just because Jess and I clearly were using it all.

My Dad shrugged as Lorelai sent him a look that said nothing but 'trouble'.

"She's in my room Hon."

"Thanks." Le-Le always did everything with a smile and a grace only a dancer can accomplish and this was no exception. As she walked up the stairs, not quite sombre, but not quite her usual self either.

I pondered for a moment, of taking a flying rugby tackle and dragging her down the stairs. A little carpet burn, perhaps a bruise or two, and everyone could go back to the way it was. Rory could go back to work. Jess and Lorelai could go back to friendly animosity, and Le-Le and I could go back the shred of normality we held over Luke's diner. But it didn't happen, Le-Le headed up the stairs turning once and looking back at me, fear written in her brown eyes. She had hid it so well until that moment I thought it wasen't even there. But in that moment I realized that Le-Le must have lay awake, just as I had, imaging this moment. But I wondered if she dreamed of the same things as I did. Did she dream of revenge, perhaps a little violence, screaming, and maybe ending it all with spitting in her face like I did? Or did simply dream of the person that had never been there, the archetypal Mom? I didn't know. She turned away from me and rounded up the stairs, head up straight as she disappeared from view, and all we heard was the click as Lorelai's door shut, with Le-Le and Rory inside.

There weren't any noises, no kicking, no screaming, there were no sounds of the high decibel screaming I knew both Lorelai's could accomplish. I wondered what Rory would think of her. I wondered if Rory could look at her tall, doe eyed, talented daughter and still think that she should have went through with the abortion. Would she see only Jess in her, or would she see her own eyes looking back at her? In the selfish place in my heart I wanted Rory to reject her, just as she had turned away from me at the dinner with no recognition in her eyes, so that we could go back to being the family I loved.

The three of us, my Dad, my Grandma and me sat apprehensively on the couch. Sitting there tracing my finger along the stripes in the fabric, I came to the conclusion that this was the day from hell. I quickly surmised that any day, that involved a drunk homeless man potentially trying to grope me, a fight with my Dad which ended in words I would rather forget, and finally my sister, my own little sister, turning to the dark side and favouring quiet conversation, rather than the outright violence that kept coming to mind should immediately be considered a date with Satan.

My mouth tasted sour, it had that same taste of anger and fear, that same taste that plummeted into my chest when Rory showed up in Luke's. No matter how much I swallowed, it wasn't going away, it went well with my pounding heart, and my clammy hands. Yes, this was defiantly hell.

A half an hour had passed when Le-Le finally came back down the stairs alone, still walking with all the confidence she had possessed when she went up there.

She reached for my Dad's hand and held it tightly.

"I'm ready to go home now."


	9. Who we are

Credit goes to ASP for the characters, and for all the people that leave me reviews and tell me I should keep going.

This will be the last full length chapter a short epilogue will be up sometime this week.

R/R :)

* * *

I woke up the next morning, my throat dry and scratchy. I looked around to find my Dad making coffee and Le-Le sitting at the kitchen table. The only sounds were the distant bubbling of the coffee pot, and the fiberized sugar crunching around in Le-Le's mouth. Not a word. Last night the extent of our interaction had been a half mumble of "Are you hungry?" With both me and Le-Le responding with an absent shake of the head, and a half hearted 'good night' on Le-Le's behalf. We had all just sat in varying places in the apartment, brooding and praying for the storm cloud called Rory to break up, and float somewhere else. Le-Le had sat on her bed, with a book she wasn't reading, I had sat on the couch, my eyes on the TV that wasn't on. My Dad had wondered aimlessly looking over at Le-Le often, probably thinking the same thing that I was. What had happened up there? There were so many words you could fit in a half an hour. But for now, Dad and I didn't know what any of them were. 

"Addy?" I shook myself awake, half-choking on my orange juice.

"Yeah?" I croaked, my voice feeling rusty from misuse.

"It's Wednesday so I'm going to meet my editor in New York, can you take Le-Le to her dance class?" It, of course, wasn't a question. It was a statement he made every Wednesday morning. Which meant while Dad was sitting in his editors office, with his demon-like boss glaring at him and correcting his grammar, a journalism degree from Yale loftily above his head I got to sprint out of my class like a mad fiend, almost always nearly knocking over some rich kid who shouts something assinine and snobby at me, speed walk to the apartment, grab Le-Le, drag her by her purple dance bag back to the bus stop, and then attempt to successfully fill two hours wondering around the neighbourhood of her dance studio where the only good entertainment was fifteen year old girls in spandex, and a corporate music shop that plays pop hits and where the employees always think I'm shoplifting. But none of that mattered, so I said the same response, I always gave.

"Sure."

I left early, just to escape the silence that kept ringing in my ears. To escape that dry, awkward kitchen table void that our family had never suffered from. We always had something to say. On any normal Wednesday, Dad would be bent over his review with a pen trying to catch last minute mistakes, while Le-Le peered under his arm annoying him by saying things like:

"Should there be a coma there?"

He would pretend to push her away, and would eventually end up giving up his last minute grammar efforts, and we would make fun of his boss, or turn on the radio, or talk about books, or annoying rich kids. We never were dry, and we were never boring, and never before had I been able to hear the 'snap, crackle, pop' of my cereal because my family didn't have a word to say to each other. Or maybe we had too many words to say to each other. Either way, nothing was being said.

I was on my way down the stairs, attempting to throw on my backpack, and straighten my tie, when I felt my Dad behind me.

"Addy, I'm worried about her."

I nodded sympathetically, hell I was too.

"This afternoon could you try to talk to her? She doesn't want to talk to me." I could tell this was silently ripping him up inside. Le-Le talked about everything with my Dad, but this was her first big step in growing up, one of those catastrophic moments that could change everything, and she wouldn't talk to him.

I understood why. Rory and Jess were connected, they were our parents, despite the fact that they openly loathed each other, they would forever be bound to each other by us. Right now I don't think Le-Le wanted to talk to someone with that connection.

I nodded. It had of course been on my agenda too. This morbid curiosity had been eating at me all night, it had morphed into a sort of jealousy in which Rory had actually spoken to Le-Le, had actually taken a half an hour, to speak to her. All I had gotten was a shocked stare, and my name uttered in fear and surprise.

I tried not to think about it, which of course meant in crazy logic that's all I thought about, Rory followed me around at Chilton that day, she walked around in my head. Pacing back and forth, her footsteps sounding strangely like her saying my name, over and over again. Nothing could get rid of her. Not skipping fourth period and smoking down the street with some half-acquaintances rich kids that were convinced they could be bad. Not walking by her graduation picture with the words 'fuck you' on my breath.

She was still with me, when I arrived a little breathless to our apartment.

"Le-Le we got four minutes let's go!" I panted pushing open the door.

My words echoed through the apartment. Usually Le-Le was waiting downstairs with Luke, her dance bag in hand, a smile, ready to go.

Today her dance bag was peeking out defectively from under her bed. Le-Le herself was lying on the couch starring up at the ceiling.

"I don't want to go today." She said, her voice a little far away.

Somehow this put things in perspective for me. Rory had left us. She had changed our lives forever. She had left us with that hollow feeling on mothers day, that hollow eyed look whenever Le-Le had a mother-daughter event at school, whether we were admitting it or not, she had taken a chunk of all of us with her. But I refused, adamantly refused in the way only a big brother could, that she would take my sisters passion.

"Damnit Le-Le get up." I stood over her, trying my best to give her the fierce big brother stare that would snap her back to where she belonged. Which was happy, enthusiastic, and strong.

She didn't. Instead she looked at me and said.

"I made her cry Addy." Hearing her say that, in a voice racked with guilt made me want to cry. But a more rational place in my mind reasoned that I had shed enough tears for that woman, and perhaps she should shed a few tears for us.

"Come on, lets get out of here."

I took her to the genetic hang out for Mariano's, the bridge. Her feet didn't reach the water, as she swung them. Mine just skimmed the water, enough to get my horridly ugly Chilton dress shoes wet.

"What did you say to her?" I had to know, I needed to know.

"I just wanted her to know who I was. What I liked, what I didn't. So I told her. All stupid things I guess. I told her I liked ballet, and Cats, and Manchester United, the clash, Harry Potter, the bell jar, and hanging out with my family. You know just in case she wondered, 'what might my daughter be doing, and what does she like half a world away'."

Those words made me wonder, what do parents that abandon their children think of them? Did she imagine us the way we were? Me, an innocent little six year old, whose greatest love was swings and pie? My sister, practically a baby, who ran around, who loved to hug? Or did she try to imagine us the way we could be. What we might like, and what we could be doing. Or perhaps did she not think of us at all.

"I told her I was happy without her. I just wanted to show her that maybe she had made a mistake not wanting to be my Mom, but I didn't care because I had Dad, and you, and I didn't need her." She started to cry, big tears rolling down her cheeks, and falling into the water, and she leaned her elbows on her knees, looking at her own reflection.

"She barely said anything. She just looked at me, and at first she smiled. Then she cried. As I was about to leave she said, she missed me. That she thought about us, and that she wanted to come back at see us." I wished in my heart that I could have heard her say those words. But then I wondered what my reaction would be. Would I give in? Let her come in and out of my life on her schedule not mine? Let myself become a pawn for her? Always waiting for her.

"But I told her not to bother, that I had my family, that I had Dad, and you, Luke, Grandma, and Nana, and that she wasn't apart of it."

My breath caught in my chest, because what she said was true, because she was right, I didn't need her, Le-Le didn't need her. She was apart of us, and she always would be, but we didn't need her.

She wrapped her arms around me, and cried into my chest.

"Do you think Dad's mad at me?" She sniffed.

I smiled a little bit, shook my head. "No he's proud of you." Just like I was.

There it was, all out in the open. We were going to be alright.


	10. Epilogue

Well here we are the end. I hope you enjoy it, and a whole hearted thanks for everyone who has reviewed, and stuck around and pushed me to finish.

**Disclaimer:** Credit for _Gilmore Girls_ characters go to ASP, credit for _Cats!_ goes to Andrew Lloyd Weber, and Addy and Le-Le are all mine.

Enjoy. R/R ;)

* * *

Time went by as it sometimes does. I went off to school, Le-Le went off to school and dance class, on Wednesdays Dad went off to New York and got yelled at his boss, Luke ran the Diner, and Lorelai managed the Inn. 

I almost wish I could say I had taken the straighten up and fly right path. That I stopped skipping class, that I stopped hanging out with those stereotypical bad-boy rich kids, that I stopped smoking, stopped fighting with my Dad. That I had stopped being that kid, with the shaggy hair and the attitude. But honestly what teenager can say they took the road less travelled?

I'm almost the age my parents were when they had me, and I can't believe it. How they were able to do it? I still feel so young, and I have so much to look forward to. Yet it gives me a whole different perspective to know that life can change at the drop of a hat, or a kegger, but I also know, that change no matter what it is, does not always have to be for the worse. I'll be graduating in June, I won't be the valedictorian, yet I'm not at the bottom of my class either. I won't be going to Harvard, nor will I be going to some mundane little college in South Carolina.

I have an interview at NYU on Friday, I'd like to see the look on their faces when I say that I am Rory Gilmore's son, how quickly they would accept a child of a world leader in international journalism to their journalism program. But I won't say that, I'll say I'm Jess Mariano's son instead, he may not have a world wide title, but he is respected in the literary community. But, perhaps, more important to me, he does what he loves for a living, while still being around for his family. I hope I can be so lucky.

But tonight, is not about me, or about my NYU interview, yet I know my family is proud of me, Dad had been sitting at the table waiting for me to come home with a huge smile, while the message blinked on the machine. Luke cuffed me on the shoulder, smiled and told me to take table five when I told him, Emily has told all her Daughters of the Revolution friends about me, I think she brags really. Yet soon she will have much more to brag about.

Tonight is about Le-Le, tonight is the night that she starts her big debut. Her dance school is putting on a production of _Cats! _Le-Le is the youngest member of the cast, and the only dancer from her class to receive a part, I was proud of her, but hell I knew she would do it, Le-Le would have done anything not to get by passed by _Cats!_

They say if you're not noticed recognized nationally by the time you're 15, you don't have much of a chance for Broadway. Well, Le-Le will be 14 next week and we could say that we all have big hopes for her, but this is all on her, and she has a Mariano spirit, and a Gilmore iron will, and she will do it all on her own.

It's opening night, the day we always said we would be there, three rows back, right in the centre, the perfect seats according to Le-Le. Her name is in the program, and she has been jittering for the last week. She doesn't have the biggest role, but its not a role to complain about. I mean I have seen the production of _Cats! _(mostly by force) enough times to know that the role of Jennyadots ain't half bad.

Sitting there with my Dad, Luke, Lorelai, and Emily, I wonder when we became a family, when Stars Hollow became home. We are a unit, we support each other, and I knew that the same crowd will be in the audience when I graduate, and I can't help but feel proud of them, of us. For making it this far.

The production of course is a success, it's a small production, but still just about as amazing as it can be, especially considering most of the people up there on that stage are younger than me. I almost couldn't believe it for myself, the amount of grace, the sophistication, the maturity my little sister managed to exude crawling on the floor in a cat costume. Dad is on his feet applauding, Luke is shaking his head I think I can hear him saying something about her once being a little girl, Emily is crying, and Lorelai is on her feet beside Jess for once, not a shred of animosity between them.

I turn my head to see if anyone else is quite as enthusiastic as the Mariano-Danes-Gilmore clan, and they are, most of them are on their feet, and its too big of a theatre to just be parents. When I saw her, Rory Gilmore, slide ever so slowly out of the back door, with a program in her hand.

I had never expected to see her, never expected to see her in this place, yet she was. Watching her little girl, who wasn't so little anymore. The little girl that had lived her whole life without her, I caught her eye, and she looked away. I wouldn't tell anyone, not Dad, not Le-Le. But it made all the difference to me, it meant we were still something to her, even if she realized it too late.

I wish I could say this had a 'and they lived happily ever after ending' but I can't. Because its not over yet.


End file.
